When me and my boyfriend go away somewhere, we usually end up in a aquarium. He loves sharks, and I find them really calming with the sound of the water, so we always find one. We recently went away to Blackpool, for the Easter weekend, and found ourselves at the Sea Life Centre.
Normally, when we go to one of these places, I struggle. I find it hard to read signs and seeing fish, and usually get my boyfriend to describe things. But not this time. Blackpool Sea Life had added accessibility features, meaning I didn’t have to struggle so much, apart with dark corridors. It made my visit there a much less stressful, and enjoyable experience. I wasn’t expecting them to have all these features. It was a nice surprise, a little lovely gesture that made me feel welcome and loved it. They had clearly thought about blind and partially sighted people, and made adjustments, and there were even a few guide dogs about the place.
They had these handheld magnifiers, that you could place against the glass cases to view the fish, and made everything bigger. They weren’t at every display, but it was just nice to have some. They had several audio announcements, in the ray section, rockpools and the shark bit, where staff talked through what were in the tanks and described them, and gave interesting facts and tips, meaning at most points I didn’t even need to read the signs. But when I did, these were accessible. They were displayed on screens, so I could get close up, and used some excellent colour contrasts to make the information easy to read. There were even these buttons that read out the signs at some places, which I discovered by accident but fell in love with, as it made it more accessible. They had tactile models of an octopus, and several places where you could feel shark skin or turtle flippers, with tactile drawings on the wall.
This wonderful world of nature was brought a bit closer, and I felt free to take my time and discover new fish and marine life, without struggling and worrying about whether I could see things or not. I really enjoyed my time visiting Blackpool Sea Life, and would definitely go again.
A clip of me getting excited at Blackpool Sea Life. Video shows a group of black and white stripey fish swimming in a tank, with a space helmet in the sand.
